


Scars and Soaking in the Sun

by Diary



Category: Scandal (TV)
Genre: Bechdel Test Fail, Canon Character of Color, Canon Gay Character, Canon Queer Character, Conversations, Disturbing Themes, Family, Friendship/Love, M/M, Mystery, Mystery Character(s), Romance, Scars, Season/Series 05
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-14
Updated: 2016-04-14
Packaged: 2018-06-02 04:04:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6549958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Diary/pseuds/Diary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tom asks Olivia for help, Olivia and Jake talk, and as usual, Rowan is up to more than meets the eye. Complete.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scars and Soaking in the Sun

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Scandal.

Olivia pauses when the elevator doors open and she sees Tom standing near her apartment.

Holding up his hands, he says, “Please.”

Digging out her cell phone, she steps out just before the doors reclose. “I don’t know if you heard or not, but I no longer have a white hat. Despite this, I’m still going to try to help innocent people. Not people like you.”

“It’s Cyrus who needs help.”

“Really? You or my father thought threatening him would work on me? Well, sorry, Tom. You gave it your best. Cyrus is someone I occasionally call a friend, but he willingly gave up the last of his innocence a long time ago. Eventually, we all have to pay for our sins.”

He hesitates.

“Here’s the one thing I’ll do for everyone: I’m Switzerland. He won’t get a call about your visit. Now,” she takes out her keys, “excuse me.”

Abruptly, he says, “Cyrus is mildly allergic to pineapple, he likes to watch The Daily Show with his daughter because she likes to pretend to be Jessica Williams, and the term ‘chess master’ describes him, but in what might be ironic, I’ve never truly understood what irony is, he’s terrible at the game of chess.”

She pauses and studies him.  “Let’s go inside.”

…

Shutting the door, she orders, “Sit.”

He does.

“You didn’t learn these facts from surveillance. You could have, but your tone and eyes tell me you didn’t. Cyrus himself gave you these facts, and I’d almost say you treasured them. Tell me what’s going on.”

“Your father wants me to spy on Cyrus.”

“Setting aside the fact I’d never help you do such a thing, you’ve just made it clear you don’t need help in doing it. Whatever the story with you and Cyrus is, you suddenly have a lot of information on him.”

“I don’t want to spy on Cyrus for your father.”

“I’ll admit, I’m surprised to hear that, but it still doesn’t answer my question. If this is just part of some plan or game-”

“I found more,” he blurts out. “We don’t have friends. We don’t have lovers. We don’t have family. We have people we like who might like the us they see back, we’re allowed to go home with people, and to a certain extent, we’re allowed to date. That’s B6-13. I’m a foot soldier, Ms Pope. Even if you could, I wouldn’t want that changed about me. But I found more, and I don’t want to spy on Cyrus for your father.”

Studying him, she asks, “What exactly did you find, Tom?”

“When B6-13 was destroyed, when you took it all away, after Senator Grant had your father and I released, I needed to find a new regiment, hopefully one with a commander who wouldn’t try to kill me. I’ve been helping him with Frankie Vargas’s campaign.”

Sighing, she rubs her head and hides her eyes. “There was a time my resolutions came true. I made them, stuck to them, and watched them come to fruition.”

Sitting up fully, she says, “You killed Jerry Grant. You killed an innocent, fifteen-year-old child.”

“You said you could never protect him from me, but while Fitz might have still gone to my apartment and cried after I left, if Jerry were alive, if all three of the Grant children were still alive, he never would have tried to kill himself. That is on you.”

“You killed Harrison. You took away a close friend, and even though I hate saying it, in a way, my foot soldier. Moreover, by doing that, you drove my best friend, Abby, away from OPA and, even worse, away from me.”   

“Worst of all, you don’t even see yourself as a victim of my father’s brainwashing. You’re fine with what you did. There’s something you don’t want to do, but you don’t want to change.”

Catching his eyes, she says, “Call this a kindness, call it cruelty, but I’m going to give you an out. My father didn’t try to kill you, Tom. I paid that guard to stab you. Enough money that he could quit his job and take an extended vacation on some sunny island. ‘I have a message from Command.’ I made him memorise those words. I told him to try not to kill you but to make it painful and messy. Traumatic. If you’d died- I would have found a way to rationalise it. It was the best way I could see to give Fitz what he needed and get Jake free. Either way, it weakened my father just a tiny bit.”

She watches him process the words.

“Are you going to ask me what I want?”

“Why would I do that,” she asks.

“Because I still don’t want to spy on Cyrus for your father. Having this information doesn’t change the fact I found more.”

Reaching over, she touches his hand. “What do you want, Tom?”

…

Cyrus is pacing when Tom gets back to the hotel. “Where have you been? I’ve left three messages. Ella has a toothache, Michael might be coming down with the flu, and Charlie always gets kicked out for stealing from the dessert tray. There’s a political luncheon in forty minutes. It took Ethan forever to find a dentist willing to make an appointment on such short notice, and this was the best time he could get. Get changed. I know better than to expect you to be able to slip subtle biases into conversation, but at least, you might be able to hear some worthwhile information.”

Tom hands him a folder. “I got more on Edison.”

Taking it, Cyrus shakes his head. “Three messages, it’d better be- Oh.” He continues reading. When he’s done, he looks up and smiles. “Good job, Tom.”

Reaching over, Tom fingers Cyrus’s tie. “How long before your appointment?”

Cyrus pulls him down into a kiss.

…

The scars from the stabbing healed well enough they can’t be seen with a causal glance, but they’re so sensitive to the touch, getting dressed and even taking a shower is challenging. If he’s not careful, the fabric or soap making contact the wrong way will produce a painful, burning sensation followed by a day-long, subtle but persistent itch.

When he and Cyrus had first gotten together, Cyrus had causally touched them, and he’d tensed and jerked.

Cyrus had withdrawn his hand and apologised, but he’d put the hand back and claimed he was just startled.

Now, Cyrus has a habit of absently splaying his palm over the scars when they’re in bed.

It makes Tom’s whole body tingle, but it doesn’t hurt.

“I should start getting ready for the luncheon.”

“One luncheon doesn’t matter,” Cyrus says. “I still have some time before I need to get Ella. Any ideas how I should spend it?”

Smiling, he kisses Cyrus and rolls over. “Could you do what you did last night?”

Cyrus’s hand re-establishes contact with the scars, and when he starts, Tom closes his eyes and soaks in the pleasure.

…

Sitting down on a bench, Jake comments, “A public place. This just might be progress for us.”

Olivia looks over. “I’m not going to try to get you on my side. If you’re not on my side, there might come a time we’ll be against each other on the battlefield again, but right now, I’m willing to be very honest about what I’m about to do. All I’m asking is for you to tell me honestly if you’re going to be on the other side.”

He studies her for a long moment before saying, “I promise, I’ll tell you whether we’re going to be on different sides. What are you planning, Olivia?”

“Tom came to me today. He-”

“Tom Larsen? Are you okay? Did he-”

“Jake.” Reaching over, she squeezes his hand. “I’m fine. I have no idea what- why- who- I’m fine. He asked for my help. And because I’m me, whoever in the hell that is, I’m going to help him.”

“What does he want?”

“For my father to leave him alone. He’s been working for Cyrus, and my father wants him to be a spy. He doesn’t want to.”

“Did he say why?”

“To quote him, ‘I found more’.”

Jake sighs. “Damn it.”

“Jake?”

“I’m not going to help your father with this, Liv, but- brace yourself.”

“Okay, well, thank you for telling me that. Can you tell me what I should brace myself for?”

“If he didn’t tell you, he and Cyrus are sleeping together. I have no proof of this. When I was Command, he and I talked once about me killing James. I could sense he felt sympathy for Cyrus, but it was so vague I had no clue whether it was because he felt personal good feelings towards Cyrus or just because it’s natural to feel sympathy for a grieving widower. Honestly, I thought he was genuinely asexual or aromantic or something along those lines. But no, of course not. Poor Tom.”

She stares. “Jake, please tell me I’m not about to be completely disappointed in you in a way I never thought I would be.”

Scoffing, he says, “Come on, Liv. If I thought Tom could have a happy life, one without killing and torturing and all the other monstrous things B6-13 had people do, with a man, I would find a nice, normal, good-looking man that I thought he might like and would like him and find a way to throw them together. I would keep doing this until he had his happy ending.”

“There’s no way this has a happy ending. Maybe neither of us has room to talk, but we both know Cyrus. However much he genuinely loved James, he manipulated him, hurt him, and brought him down. Not intentionally, but he did the same thing to his ex-wife. His current husband is someone you convinced to sign papers to keep him, Cyrus, from disgrace.”

“And I know Tom. He devoted his life to your father and Fitz both. As Command, I once gave him an order that had a very high chance of him dying, and thankfully, he didn’t have to follow it, but he was going to. There was no hesitation, no protests, no nothing other than a nod and him setting himself up for almost certain death.”

“This is someone Cyrus isn’t going to have to manipulate, and while Cyrus is nowhere near as bad as your father, considering what he is, that isn’t exactly as comforting a thought as it first appears to be, is it? Never mind that, just because Cyrus doesn’t need to manipulate Tom, he might still do it, anyways, and I’m not sure how Tom would react to that. None of the reactions I can think of have positive outcomes.”

Letting out a slight sigh, she says, “You’re right. I can’t deny or refute any of that. With what Tom did to Jerry, I really don’t even understand why I’m helping him. But I’m going to.”

“I understand,” he says.

She nods and starts to get up.

Grabbing her wrist, he tugs her back down. “Hey, look at me.”

She does.

“I do understand. You want to know why you’re doing this? Because this is Tom moving closer towards the sun. An assassin, a spy, someone who has easily disregarded numerous human lives in the past, it may just be one person, but he’s telling you that he sees another human being and doesn’t want to hurt them. He’s showing the capacity for love and a willingness to sacrifice not for a mission but for another person. He hasn’t just found more, he wants to be more than your father’s enforcer.”

Giving her a wry smile, he says, “Whether he’ll ever get fully into the light, I don’t know. But at least, he can see the sun in the distance and knows undeniably that it’s there. Get him as close to it as you can, Olivia. Whatever your father does, I’m going to sit this one out. Unfortunately, though, that’s all I can do for you and him, too.”

“Thank you,” she repeats.

…

There’s a knock on the door.

Eli opens it and smiles. “Come on in. Jake’s out with Livvie.”

His guest comes in, and Eli shuts the door.

“The plan’s progressing exactly as you said it would.”

“Of course, it is,” he answers. “I know my agents, and I know my daughter and son. I know Cyrus, too.”

“What’s the next step?”

“Cyrus is going to have a minor accident. Nothing serious. And we’re going to leave a few crumbs pointing towards me. Then, we’re going to bring in an old friend to really stir things up.”

“Is there any point in asking what your objection to us just telling them is?”

“They need to find out this way,” Eli answers. “As I said, I know them. However they’ll feel when this is all over, our goal will undeniably be reached. Personally, I think Tom will be able to appreciate all of this.”

“Maybe, but it’s highly unlikely any of the others will.”

Eli shrugs. “Would you like some leftovers? I don’t think either of the kids is going to be home tonight.”

“Yeah, sure. Thanks.”


End file.
